Behaving Badly

Mary Gaitskill’s anatomy of frustrated intimacy

Larissa Pham

Bad Behavior:

Stories

by Mary Gaitskill

Simon & Schuster

$14.99 List Price

IN “A ROMANTIC WEEKEND,” the second story inBad Behavior, Mary Gaitskill’s grim and lyrical debut collection from 1988, two characters go to Washington, DC, for the titular getaway. Much of their time together goes awry because of a drastic mismatch of expectations and psychosexual needs. Beth, the female protagonist, has fallen suddenly in love with her companion. She conjures a fantasy of complete submission and devotion:

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